Okay, I think I understand: if your goal is to fully & maximally stress your aerobic energy systems, you can do so better by swimming continuously than by swimming intervals (regardless of pace).
Back to your statement that "anaerobic interval training alone will not tax the aerobic system optimally", it boils down to whether the extra aerobic training from an LSD session gives enough incremental benefit, or whether you're already at the point of diminishing returns after the aerobic training you have gotten during anaerobic sets. The answer to that question will presumably depend on how much time you have available to train, what your target events, are, etc.
Okay, I think I understand: if your goal is to fully & maximally stress your aerobic energy systems, you can do so better by swimming continuously than by swimming intervals (regardless of pace).
Back to your statement that "anaerobic interval training alone will not tax the aerobic system optimally", it boils down to whether the extra aerobic training from an LSD session gives enough incremental benefit, or whether you're already at the point of diminishing returns after the aerobic training you have gotten during anaerobic sets. The answer to that question will presumably depend on how much time you have available to train, what your target events, are, etc.
Yes, I agree with all of that.
So do these breaks prevent the maximization of aerobic capacity? Good question. Half lives of most physiological changes that occur whilst training aerobically is ~30s. If you make a rest interval around 15-20s, your aerobic metabolism barely notice that you actually stopped. Does this help clarifying a point on the difference between steady effort and interval work for training aerobic metabolism?
Note that this very important principle is what helps us to design any sort of set, using intervals to train any type of metabolism. You can train at threshold on reps of 25m without a doubt, as long as the overall set's duration is long enough (>10min) and that the rest is always kept well below 30s and that the overall intensity level over the total duration of the set puts you in the right zone.
Would one long easy continuous swim improve aerobic capacity? As much as Base is made of everything, just about any aerobic effort will contribute to improving your vo2max. However to develop it to its full potential, 5min bouts at max velocity for the duration is what works best. Lower level endurance does a great job at, for instance, developing your network of capillaries, but it will have a much lower impact on what's required to improve your cardiac output. That is better improved during max efforts.
At this point it is worth to remember that aerobic capacity, or vo2max has two bottlenecks.
1) The ability to the working muscle to deoxygenize the blood (use the o2) and
2) The ability that your system has to provide this o2, which is conditioned mainly by the volume of blood your heart can process.
The former needs a strong capillary network as well as good mitochondira employees (enzymes). The later requires a stronger cardiac muscle as well as an increase in your plasma volume.
During the time course of vo2max adaptation, early in their career, athletes are often restricted by the former, but passed a certain point, the heart itself becomes the bottleneck. You probably understand now that once you reach this step, the HR obtained at Vo2Max is very close too if not spot on your maximal possible hr value.
Designing an aerobic capacity set that doesn't bring you close to your max hr is kind of missing the point somehow. During a full blown 400free, you definitely reach near max HR values, by the middle of the distance roughly.
Can hard anaerobic interval training along maximize aerobic capacity? If you refer to reps of ~1min with a lot of rest: No, it will likely impair it. If you refer to longer intervals ~>2min or to shorter intervals with ~'t really matter too much, I lack the willpower to train anaerobic every day anyway so I will just make my easy swims continuous just in case :) +1
Hi Solar,
I agree that it's pretty unlikely I'm going to trip up any heavy duty physiology researchers and that's not my goal. The two more probable scenarios are a) that I have a misunderstanding and that in the process of questioning I'll figure out and correct it, or b) that the model is valid within the domain it was developed for but perhaps the domain we're talking about is different enough that it violates some of the model's assumptions.
Already I see that as others have pointed out a component of this is training to enable you to do the training that will improve performance rather than training to directly improve performance.
I still have a suspicion that the models might work better in the domain of endurance events (e.g. 5k, 10k, etc.) than in sprint events. Typical training sessions of course fall into these longer durations but I am still curious if it is possible to first determine what sort of training is optimal for 30s and 60s events, and then figure out what training is necessary to be able to do that training. Perhaps it will end up in the same place, but at least I'll understand and have confidence in it.
All in all, I don't mind being wrong, I just want to know what exactly I'm wrong about so I can be right next time. And just accepting that people who are smarter and more knowledgeable than I am think I'm wrong doesn't move my understanding forward.
Btw, thanks to both you and Steve for your explanations of these models, it really did make it all a lot clearer.
@Lindsay, here's what an exercise physiologist has to go through in creating a model. We like to think that well, they overlook things etc, but I do not think it is the case.
Just about anything you and I can think of in term of caveat etc, they can find out too. This post can be found somewhere on cyclingforums. It is not an attempt at demonstrating his skills etc, or to do any bling-bling. And of course, it is far from being exhaustive. Exercise physiology is a very complex matter that would require a full book.
It probably took him a full decade to complete his works, lots of lab testing, and several hundreds of file analysis, married to a trackie, himself a top level time trialist etc etc etc etc. Also let us not forget that this model is kind of based on Timp somehow, which also took more than a decade to elaborate. All this work done by extremely smart people, Banister already has some entries in sports history literature, and Coggan, obviously it's just a matter of time. They both focused solely on one thing: achieving a model that respects the principles of exercise physiology as they learned it during the course of their PhD.
If you refer to this mysterious process during which the Liver converts Lactate back into glycogen, you're absolutely correct. This process in fact kind of slows you down. It ain't aimed at helping the working muscles, but rather to make absolutely 110% positively sure that your brain will never lack blood glucose. So this glyco is likely going to be converted back to glucose where it will travel the blood stream up to your brain.
THAT said though, aerobic contribution to lactate metabolism isn't limited to this mysterious phenomenon. Not at all. Quite simple Q. Lactic Acid becomes Pyruvate which can then reenter the mitochondria for being oxidized. I think that this process is often referred to as being Cellular Respiration. This way, Lactate is definitely considered as a fuel, a powerful one. And it helps boosting your swim endurance pace velocity as well as delaying severe acidosis (resulting from sprinting a full 100 for instance).
Sorry for not addressing so much of your comment, but fatigue isn't something I am interested in discussing right now, and I think muscle fiber types and how enzymes are utilized are too low level for a training discussion.
I was talking about conversion of lactate to glucose in the liver, the Cori cycle. I was trying to keep things high level but provide enough detail to justify or refute my earlier statement on the need to only train anaerobically.
What other process exists to utilize lactate? I do not believe a muscle cell can utilize lactate directly for energy and it is just a waste product to a muscle cell.
Sorry for not addressing so much of your comment No probs. You don't have to.
I do not believe a muscle cell can utilize lactate directly for energy and it is just a waste product to a muscle cell.
Well you definitely should. Because before blood lactate gets recycled in glucose then glycogen through the Cori Cycle, your system will try to use it as a fuel directly:
Clearance of lactate from the blood can occur either through oxidation within the muscle fibre in which it was produced or it can be transported to other muscles fibres for oxidation (31,30). Lactate that is not oxidized in this way diffuses from the exercising muscle into the capillaries and it is transported via the blood to the liver (31). Through a process known as the Cori cycle, lactate can be converted to pyruvate in the presence of oxygen, which can then be converted into glucose (2). This glucose can either be metabolized by working muscles or stored in the muscles as glycogen for later use (2). www.sport-fitness-advisor.com/lactic-acid.html
To the best of my knowledge, the process during which blood lactate is brought some place else where it can be oxidized is called Lactate Shuffle. And the process in which lactic acid is used as a fuel would be called Lactate metabolism. Because it is really what it is. Lactate is being used as a fuel here, inside muscle cells. Again here, fairly high level. Lactic Acid (which is the name we should give to lactate before it enters in your blood stream) gets converted back to Pyruvate. Can then enter mitochondria so that it can get oxidized by o2.
Some physiologists believe that without this process, it would be impossible to sustain high threshold velocities for prolonged durations. A lot believe that the glycogen pool availability can not, in itself, justify how you can remain at maxlass for 45 straight minutes. Lactate is a powerful fuel. And not only this, physiologists also believe that in a lot of areas, your body prefers to deal with lactate compared to with sugar for instance. The heart itself loves this as much as an alcoholic may appreciate beer. The heart, brain and most slow twitch fibers are very apt at clearing lactate from the blood to the extent that they prefer lactate as a source of fuel (27,28,29). Note however, that lactate must first be converted into pyruvate before it can be used as a source of energy.
The two more probable scenarios are a) that I have a misunderstanding and that in the process of questioning I'll figure out and correct it, or Most probable (based on the little that I know about you). The decision of not using a model is still pretty sound. Any good coach can easily live without them obviously. I did not use such a model in prep for the 50/100/200 fly. Although I will in prep for the 1500.
Already I see that as others have pointed out a component of this is training to enable you to do the training that will improve performance rather than training to directly improve performance. That's the idea. You use the model to monitor your Base development, then you use it to assist you in designing the appropriate anaerobic capacity development program, which will cost you some of the Base. Then, later in the season, you use it one more time to assist you in tapering for your Sprinting Day, or Racing Weekend (as opposed to your sprint event). You got to have the fitness to perform at your best in all events, which is very often more than one. Glycogen levels are the main bottleneck to this. A single 200 all out will probably deplete it by more than 50%. So Base built earlier in the season, whilst not having a direct impact on one's ability to perform one single 100m, may have an impact on one's ability to perform a 100, followed by a relay swim, followed by a 50fly etc.....
All in all, I don't mind being wrong, I just want to know what exactly I'm wrong about so I can be right next time. This is why I love Andy's text which I quoted earlier, and where he ends with some apologies to the two members having gotten the physiological aspects of his concept wrong. It's impossible to be right, unless like he says, you previously got trained in exercise physiology.
And just accepting that people who are smarter and more knowledgeable than I am think I'm wrong doesn't move my understanding forward. They are in no way smarter than any of us, it's just that physiology is their specialty and that most of the flaws we mere mortals can think of in criticizing their models, they thought about them too.
More interesting food for thoughts. Alex Simmon is one of my facebook friends. I thought about dropping him a PM today. Here's my message:
Charles Couturier June 16 at 11:30am
Hi Alex,
I was wondering about a few questions for which you may have a few answers, if you have time of course.
I'm wondering about how you approach planning for a Kilo specialist.
1. Do you use periodization at all?
2. Do you get these folks to build a Base, Grow their CTL in other words
3. If so, would the CTL requirement be pretty much the same for all Kilo specialists
4. Do you address L6 (anaerobic capacity) development all year round?
5. How many hours per week would an Elite train to become good at it?
6. Do you use weight resistance training at all?
If you already posted answers to these on your blog then maybe just point me toward the right articles. I'd like to draw a parallel between Cycling Training for the Kilo and Swim Training for the 100.
Thanks a lot!!!!!
Charles
His answers
1. yes
2. it depends, dedicated specialist kilo riders are pretty rare, so usually training covers more than just this one event, so for most riders then the answer is yes. you still need excellent aerobic condition for a kilo
3. no, everyone is different in the training load they can sustain and the rate at which training load increase can be tolerated
4. L6/7 (anerobic capacity / neuromuscular power) is done all the time, it's a matter of how much and how intensive and the type
5. 15+ but hard to specifically quantify training time when doing anaerobic efforts. they are short with a lot of recovery, so depends what you are counting, plus if any off bike training time is included
6. For kilo, yes but the nature of that depends a lot. Much better off with more explosive type actions than pure strength work. Strength is needed for the starting pedal stroke. Once a rider has a basic level of strength (e.g. a free squat 2-2.5 times body mass for males), then more is a waste and just adds mass and aero resistance - one simply cannot apply the forces at the speeds necessary.
For the record, I humbly consider Alex as having a huge edge over me on pretty much all aspects. He's been using Assisted Performance Modeling from day1, he is in the *knows* and he works full time as a coach, mostly specializing in training and racing on track (events similar in duration as swimming).
So 15 hours of training. Aerobic is important. All that carefully monitored using scientifically accepted means. Imagine for a swimmer, which has to deal with an incredibility higher level of complexity, just to optimize propulsion. Swimmer is half way in between the cyclist and the pianist. Got to train race pace, sure, but got to work on those scales at slower speed too (pianist). High elbow (EVF) in freestyle and butterfly, Fly arm entry that make no splash. And wow. The breaststroker. Why do you think we fall asleep during a BS event? Cause their race space stroke specifics is very close to their low base endurance stroke specifics anyway. For them, they can kick real hard, pull real hard even when swimming at slower pace. Targets same muscle fibers, involve nervous system the same way. And during the prolonged glide, they improve efficiency. 2 for the price of one for these folks. And what about this delicate waving action, the breaststroke dolphin kick. For me? A no brainer for breaststrokers.
In order to see benefits of slow endurance swimming on sprint race pace, gotta think outside the box. And there's a lot to think about. These benefits are even greater if most of this endurance volume is done at your best stroke, the one you're actually getting prepared for. And even more greater if you're performing this base mileage on a stroke count diet.
The lower the rate, the higher the torque. The higher the torque, the more you involve Fast Twitch Type IIa in the process. The higher the power on each stroke, the longer the glide, the longer the glide, therefore more time to remain aware about body position thus improving Economy. That's why it's fair to state that some of the gains made on distance per stroke at slower speed, will remain at race pace. Descending time sets in order to gradually increase the rate and hopefully the speed. But the Base, where dps is being developed, is at slow speed.
Then most kicking done at say, threshold pace, well it contributes to improve your leg muscle endurance. This burning sensation. Pull paddle work will undoubtedly overload upper body muscles without the need of increasing turnover as much. No leg so not much glyco wasted nor lactate increase. How many of us can claim having a solid back-to-*** turn? That can be worked in a 25back/25breast set, slow speed there again. That list just goes on and on. All aerobic.
Swimming is a heavily aerobic discipline. The contribution of this energy system goes well over the specifics of the event you're preparing for.
Consider this thought experiment: after taking a year off, you spend a long base phase doing nothing -- absolutely nothing -- except easy distance. But you do tons of it, so that you'll be able to handle the heavy training in the build/peak phase. After all, base is base, right?
Now it's time to start doing some fast 100s. Even if you can handle 20k yards per week, and you've trained your shoulders and your lungs to handle the work, are you going to be able to handle 10 x 100 sprints right off the bat? Have you trained your muscles and your mind adequately to handle the work? This is an honest question.
Maybe "everything is base" isn't literally true. But since we don't usually completely abandon anaerobic work in the base phase, it's close enough to true not to make much practical difference.
Andy told me that most data (if not all) available on the Trimp system was done using short duration event. I didn't ask him to define "short duration" though.
I guess this depends on his definition of short. Most of the published studies are for 5 km runs and up. Typically subjects are distance runners, triathletes, soccer players. The shortest duration I can find the model applied to is a test on a (single) elite 1500 m runner.
An interesting side note: the original TRIMP model -- which resulted in the 45-day decay time for fitness that many models inherit, etc -- was developed using 4-5 km running data, with n=2 subjects, both of whom were developers of the model! (Banister and Morton) I guess they're following in the footsteps of MDs who experiment on themselves.
